How will new advanced information technologies impact work? This is a major focus of public debate right now, driven by widespread fears that automation will soon leave tens of millions unemployed. But debate so far has tended to neglect the relationship among technological innovation, political economy, and the law of work. This is a major omission, since the automation of particular tasks doesn’t just happen. Rather, it takes place under laws that are subject to democratic oversight and revision – and with different laws, we could encourage a radically different path of technological development, one in which workers have a real voice, and in which they share consistently in technology-driven productivity gains.

Take two upcoming transformations that we’re all familiar with: the automation of some kinds of driving and some kinds of fast-food work. Within a few years, truckers, delivery drivers, and taxi drivers may be able to use an autonomous mode consistently on highways. Later on, they may be able to do so on major suburban and rural streets. But given the wide variation in road quality, humans will likely need to pilot vehicles in residential areas and on city streets for some time to come. And given the wide variation in building structures that delivery robots would need to navigate, humans will almost certainly need to complete deliveries in many instances.

Entrepreneurship in the international arms trade leaves everyone (except the entrepreneur) worse off.

In contemporary American law, few figures are as lionized as the “entrepreneur.” Lobbyists evoke entrepreneurship as a cornucopia of better goods and services at lower prices. Even ostensibly academic business law courses tend to offer a narrative of wise incremental development of legal doctrine toward enabling disruption, easy entry into markets, and ultra-flexible corporate forms. The lawyer is ideally, in this view, a fixer capable of profit-maximizing distributions of responsibility and liability. Some even dream of automating this role via smart contracts, to ensure even more rapid entrepreneurial activity.

Professional Responsibility courses also tend to adopt a similarly reverential attitude toward the business client, instilling an ethic of “zealous advocacy” in generations of students. Few question whether the near-evacuation of ethical self-reflection from advocacy roles systematically advantages dubious (or worse) business propositions.